Tuesday 20th April 2004

Bit tender and tierd, I wasn't as nervous as what I thought except sitting waiting to be called in.

When we arrived we had to pay for the bed, Nath had to go to another room to do his bit for the creation of our embies while I sat and waited for my name to be called. It was called and we had to check name, date of birth etc then led into another room with other couples to wait. My name was called and we had to go get changed, I went into one room and Nath into another.
The anaesthiologist and my Dr came in to see how things were and to be recommended that I be fully put under because of the amount of follies and how uncomfy it will be. We waited a bit longer and then my name was called.

We went in, I had to get on the table and Nath was right by my side. All as I remember is a needle going into my right arm, the blood preasure cuff going onto my left, myDr saying he was going to scrub up and that was it.

Woke up, went in and out of sleep for a while. They gave me some drugs for the pain then moved me a couple of beds down and I saw hubby come walking up to me. He told me they the retrived 9 eggs out of 19 follies, was a little disappaointed as I thought there would of been more.

Back in time

This next part will be back near my first cycle in April 2004.

Wed 14th April:
We went for our ultra sound today, was so scard that there wasn't going to be any follicles but to our surprise we have 20+, no wonder I am so bloated. After the scan we had to go to another room to see a nurse who would explain the next step for us as in the trigger injection to make you ovulate and how if you have over 20 follicles you can Hyperstimulate. This means OHSS occurs when the ovaries respond to stimulation by producing too many follicles and eggs. When this occurs then the ovaries enlarge to several times their usual size and fluid from the blood stream leaks into the abdominal cavity causing it to swell noticeably. This leaves the blood more concentrated and viscous and prone to spontaneous small or large blood clots. In a Mild cases of OHSS may pass unnoticed, cause only a sensation of bloating, sudden weight gain as the result of the fluid retention or mild lower abdominal pain. Vomiting is a worrying symptom especially when there is also a reduction in urine output. This will be manifest by the passage of small or infrequent amounts of concentrated urine. In more serious instances there may be an accumulation of fluid in the spaces around the lungs and shortness of breath.
The consequences of severe OHSS (which is very rare) include kidney and liver failure and blood clots (thrombosis) in major arteries or veins. Unrecognised or inappropriately treated OHSS can be life threatening.

Sunday 19th April:
Had my trigger injection tonight, I had to use a packet of frozen pea's to numb the tummy as I heard it stings lol. All went fine with my husband laughing at me.

Monday 19th April:
Am nervous about egg pickup tomorrow at 8 am, I hope theres lots of eggs and not just empty follies.....Oh and not alot of pain lol.

Walking into that specialist room was one of the most daunting things I had done in a while, whilst excited about getting started the negativity of it all started to come across when he started reading out the low figure rate of pregnancy rates within IVF. Being told that the average for falling pregnant is about 4 times, this miscarriage rate is high especially with pcos and of course the price!
We were give a pathology script for both of us to have HIV and Hep blood tests done and all pending ok we could start asap and as this was late December of 03 we had to wait till Feb to start as the clinics all closed for christmas and January.

I was to go on the pill for 21 days, have a period, start sniffing synaral a nasal spray, which taste like crap. Go for a ultra sound to make sure the lining of my uterus wasn't to thin or thick, then 2 days later I started injections (150iu) for 8 days. I was so scared I hate needles at the best of times but me being me had to get Nath to do it for me!! They were done through the tummy and without me looking lol. They wern't to bad to start off with but towards the end I was over them.
I had to go for an ultra sound on day 8 to check to see if my folicles on my ovaries were growing to the right size and as expected no they were still alittle small, so another 4 days of injections.....YIPPY!!!!!! Back I go for an ultra sound and I was given the ok to go for egg pickup in two days. I had to wait for a phone call from the hospital to tell me when to have my trigger injection, this is an injection to make you ovulate, I waited and waited but still no phone call I honestly thought they had forgot about me and as usual I worked myself up for nothing as the phone call soon came. Trigger was set for 8.30pm Sunday night.
Hearing that the trigger shot was a stinger I woosed out and had to put a packet of frozen pea's on my tummy to numb it lol, I'm such a sook with this stuff.

Egg pickup was booked for Tues 20th April at 8am at Melbourne IVF and I'm crapping myself of the unknown!!!!

The Next Step

After we had been sent to a gyno to help with the pcos and trying to get pregnant it was still not happening. I had been through 8 Clomid cycles with still nothing at the end of each of them, 8 months of tears and heart ache. My Dr decided to do a Laparoscopy (exploratory surgery), which I was told was about a 45 minute procedure and I could go home later that day. I remember a Dr coming into me to explain everything and to give me the complications of could happen and I remember him saying to me 'there is a risk that the bowl could be knicked, but its only like a one in 5000 chance'!!!! I was woken up only to be told that there had been a complication and I was about to be transported to another hospital.

When I woke up the next day I was informed that my bowl had been knicked!! The 45 minute procedure had turned into 3 plus hrs with my husband having no idea as to what was going on, when he asked he was told that there had been a complication and that's all they could say. With time passing on he was becoming more worried, so he went out to the car to ring my mother to tell her she better come down. As he was walking in a nurse met him and asked him to meet the Dr in the chapel and of course as you could imagine he was as worried as anything by now.......and he was told what had happened.

I was in hospital for a week and off work for a month with a cut from my belly button to my pubic area and ended up taking me 2 months to get over it. We had our appointment with my gyno to tell me one of the most devastating things of my life.........When my appendix had burst when I was 16 (misdiagnosed by a so called Dr), the scar tissue had grown all through my reproductive system and crushed my tubes tight. He said it was a mess in there and in later life I would have to have an operation to remove it all. The next thing that came out of his mouth I was not prepared for.... I will never conceive naturally!!!! Our only option now is IVF and I was referred to a specialist.